Pembleton and Bolander drive out to a murder scene in a suburban neighborhood; on the
way, Bolander waxes philosophical about how different people see the same thing differently. The victim on the porch of the house is Hikmet Gersel, a 17 year-old Turkish exchange student
who for some reason was wearing black and white make-up and a leather jacket; the shooter is
Jim Bayliss, Tim's cousin. Upon hearing of the shooting, Tim rushes over to Jim's house to
console Jim's wife Shannon and warn Pembleton not to step out of line on this one.
Munch tells Lewis matter-of-factly that their new restaurant is losing money; Lewis sees
the problem as the French chef whose food is a little too weird for the working man's
tastes. Lewis has a way for the bar to start making a profit: fire the chef.
Back at the squadroom, Tim tells Frank that he and Jim lived next door to each other and that
Jim and his brother Kurt were like brothers to him. Bayliss tries to drill into Pembleton's
head that Jim was a not a smokehound, but his cousin and a truly upstanding man; Frank
doesn't doubt it, but applies a barium residue test on Jim's hands anyway. Tim stalks
into Giardello's office and asks if he can be in the Box during Jim's interrogation; Gee
refuses. Frank and Stan question his cousin; it appears that Jim was playing with his kids
in the living room when the doorbell rang. Suddenly his wife screamed; Jim rushed over
to the door alone and saw Gersel babbling and
pounding on the front door. After a few failed attempts at trying to shoo him away, Jim
went for his gun and pointed it at Gersel's chest, who tried to grab for it and got shot.
Shannon is next in the Box, but Pembleton and Bolander are surprised to find that her
story is not the same as Jim's; she was much less hysterical and actually went back to the
door with her husband. Her story implied that the situation was tense, but not explosive. By an innocuous comment about Jim's dislike of Baltimore cab drivers, it is revealed that
Jim may have some sort of racist bias against Arabic people. Gersel's friend is brought
in next, who explains that the two were headed to a KISS party and
that they wore black-and-white makeup and leather jackets to imitate the band. His account
is different in that he says that Hikmet had raised his hands upon seeing the gun. Tim
argues that the witness is unreliable because he had been across the street, in the dark, and
drunk. Pembleton understands how Jim's version could be different from the friend's, but
not his own wife's; as a result he wishes to interview Jim again. Despite Tim's efforts, Gee
allows Frank's request.
Jim is brought in again and the detectives try the racism angle; they tell him about his
prior for aggravated assault on a man named Parvis Nejad a few years back, and also about
Kurt, who was shot and killed during Desert Storm and was probably why Jim developed a hate
for Arabs. When asked why his first impulse was to kill Gersel instead of calling the cops,
Tim pounds on the one-way viewing glass in furious protest and ends up shattering it.
The bullet that killed Gersel is matched to Jim's gun and Danvers suggests sending the case
to a grand jury. Bayliss wonders why Jim is being overly prosecuted just for a bad
judgment call while Pembleton thinks that it was racially motivated. Bolander thinks about
what an incredibly tough year the homicide unit is having- Crosetti dies; he, Howard
and Felton get shot; Munch, Lewis and Bayliss are having troubles with the bar; and now
the Gersel case, which Stan thinks will destroy whatever friendship Frank and Tim had.
Munch takes Lewis' advice and fires their chef. Lewis says that he has already found
a more than suitable replacement: his grandmother, who has been the hash queen at
Down Home Soul Cooking for 12 years and has a following; Munch approves.
The grand jury hearing is covered by reporters from every major TV station in Baltimore. Jim, put on the stand, says that he was merely trying to defend his home; he feels terrible
about what he did, but he also feels that he had done the right thing. The jury recommends
that all charges against Jim Bayliss be dropped, and the court audience breaks into applause. Bayliss hunts down Pembleton and asks for an apology that is definitely not forthcoming; Frank
tells Tim that his cousin doesn't even realize how much of a racist he is, and that he finds
it unbelievable that the court audience applauded the death of a 17 year-old boy. |
Starring
Daniel Baldwin Det. Beau Felton
Ned Beatty Det. Stanley Bolander
Richard Belzer Det. John Munch
Andre Braugher Det. Frank Pembleton
Isabella Hofmann Capt. Megan Russert
Clark Johnson Det. Meldrick Lewis
Yaphet Kotto Lt. Al Giardello
Melissa Leo Det. Kay Howard
Kyle Secor Det. Tim Bayliss
Guest Starring
David Morse Jim Bayliss
Zeljko Ivanek ASA Ed Danvers
Ami Brabson Mary Whelan-Pembleton
Peggy Yates Maria Delgado
Harlee McBride Dr. Alyssa Dyer
Mel Proctor Grant Besser
With
Johnny Alonso Scholtz
Scott Wesley Morgan Westmoreland
Rhonda R. Overby Reporter
Holly Rudkin Shannon Bayliss
Makan Shirafkin Hikmet Gersel
Music heard in Colors
The Kinks A Well-Respected Man
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